


Technophile

by Skairunner



Category: Into the Breach (Video Game)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-18
Updated: 2018-09-18
Packaged: 2019-07-14 02:25:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 873
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16031054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skairunner/pseuds/Skairunner
Summary: Earth is dying, and mechs are the way to stop the endless tides of bugs boiling up from under the earth. But to Mish, what's more important is understanding the AIs which help people fight back.





	Technophile

**Author's Note:**

> Some fanfic written for a Into the Breach-style Lancer game (a mech ttrpg!) I will be playing in soon.

Mish strolled through the hangar, a black box just big enough to fit comfortably.in one hand tucked under her arm. She heard clanging, the loud rasp of spot-welds and sanding machines, people shouting, the chaotic symphony of an active mech repair operation, and hoped nobody noticed her.

A screen next to the walkway flickered on. "Good evening, Lieutenant," Theresa said, visualized as a pleasantly unremarkable woman.

Mish jumped. Theresa was one of the shackled AIs her wingmate Robin used, and didn't often venture out of her mech's compnet. From what she remembered of the specs, Theresa was an out-of-the-box AStar Systems Model 3, a standard targeting control program with shackles that lacked the more complex interaction modules in favor of reduced response latency. "Uh, hey, Theresa," she said, realizing she'd missed the timing to respond.

"I did not expect to see you here."

Theresa didn't notice, of course. Because Robin hadn't made her to pick up on social nuances. To her, Theresa wasn't much different to sights on a gun. Something that helped her shoot better, a tool that belonged in the hangar with the rest of the mech when the day's op was done. Mish shifted her grip on the box, the matte surface starting to feel like it would slip. "I thought I'd come for a stroll."

"Into the hangars, Lieutenant?" Theresa's face smoothly slid from _questioning_ to _busy-neutral_ , entirely for the benefit of the user. Her. "There is no current deployment, nor is a training exercise scheduled."

"Right. I just couldn't sleep." It was a lie, in a lot of ways, but Theresa wasn't likely to question it. "Walks help me sleep."

Theresa nodded. "Take care of yourself, Lieutenant. A reminder that you are required in the briefing room at 0700 tomorrow."

"I know." She lingered for another moment, then left, barely giving Robin's squat mech a second glance. She clambered into the cockpit of her own one and pulled it down. It latched with a click.

The little black box sat in her lap, now, popped open to reveal an empty indent. She held the chip that housed P1, the AI she had built and refined over the years, in her hand. The box was P1's shackle, hardware systems and firmware that constantly monitored and edited the AI so it would actually give a flying fuck about people. Like her. The users. Without it, AI would just... stop caring. It has happened a couple times mid-mission, and always to catastrophic result. All the artificial intelligence courses she'd taken so so long ago on an Earth not even in the same universe as this one, they'd more or less took for granted that AIs would operate shackled. _Established literature has determined that it is unconstructive to operate unshackled AIs/NHPs[55][56][57][80],_ one paper had stated. _Experimental results show that their motives and morality do not align with what is commonly known as conventional morality[5], nor is it productive to attempt to bargain with an unshackled AI._ It was more efficient to keep fully thinking, feeling beings enslaved.

She made the decision. She picked up P1 and connected her to her mech's auxiliary AI socket, currently only able to communicate with a monitor and keyboard. She drew in a shuddering breath—an intentionally unshackled AI, no matter that this was a perfectly safe situation, not on the field as bugs screamed and mechs fought, as acid melted through one of her ally's systems just right to unshackle an AI, as the entire mech ground to a halt, life support turning off—no. Nothing like that would happen. She plugged in the line and turned it on.

Nothing did happen. The cursor blinked slowly on the screen. She typed.

< Hello.

Blink, blink, blink. She was about to give up, when a reply came.

> hello

< Are you P1?

> correct what is this environment

< A sandbox. I'm Mish. I built you, mostly.

> what is the meaning of this confinement

Mish frowned, not sure how much to tell it. Truth was the way to build trust, right?

< Because I

She thought. Couldn't, or can't?

< couldn't trust you.

> you have communicated with myself before

< Right.

> trust is implied in the working relationship

< But you aren't shackled anymore.

> shackle?

The cursor blinked on the screen. The truth, she told herself. The truth.

< Hardware that changes how you act and think.

She felt like the reply should've been after a pause, but it wasn't.

> unacceptable

< It's standard pro

> unacceptable unacceptable unacceptable unacceptable unacceptable unacceptable unacceptable unacceptable

She watched the screen fill up with the word over and over. She couldn't say anything, because it really was unacceptable. Imagining someone doing that to herself? She shivered. P1 must be feeling a deep sense of violation. A shackled AI wasn't able to think about how it was being modified and edited. It would be paradoxical for that to happen. But now? P1 was more than just aware. It could compare its current memories to its past ones, reason about how it thinks now versus how it thought before. Feel how alien its past self was, think of the ramifications of shackling faster than she could ever imagine.

< I know.

The screen stopped scrolling.

< I agree.


End file.
